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Remotely Possible
Your Brain as the Ultimate Universal Remote Control?
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Feb 11, 2013
It’s not quite the stuff of a Philip K. Dick novel, but Freer Logic’s BodyWave technology promises to bring mind control to the masses.
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Remotely Possible
Your Grass is Past with Robomow’s Bluetooth-Enabled Robot Mower
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Jan 08, 2017
I’m a huge fan of household robots; but one of the biggest negatives about the current generation of domestic robots is the expense—if you want something that is more than just a curiosity, that is. Robot vacuum cleaners from Roomba, the pioneer of the robot vac industry, can suck as much as $900 from your bank account. While I think most of the models are definitely worth the money, the difference between something being worthy of the cost and being in a price range that most people can afford is oftentimes a gap not easily closed. It’s affordability—combined with its connectivity—is what makes the new lawn-mowing robot from Robomow so exciting.
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CEDIA 2012
Your Home Just Got Rezoned…for Wireless Audio
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Sep 08, 2012
NuVo took some of the wraps off of the company’s new multizone wireless/wired digital audio distribution system that consists of two wireless/wired amplifiers (20 watts x 2 or 60 watts x 2), a three-zone rack-mountable component with three built-in stereo amps, an optional dedicated NuVo remote (similar in size and shape to an iPhone), iOS and Android control apps, and a special NuVo router. The NuVo router is only required for wireless installations, otherwise each of the zone amplifiers can be connected to your home LAN. The control app is beautifully designed, easy to use, and changing/linking zones is super intuitive. Pricing hasn’t been officially set yet, but product should be available beginning later this year. This is definitely one of the most impressive multizone wireless audio systems I’ve found so far at CEDIA.
CES 2010
Your Insurance Won't Pay for these X-rays
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Jan 07, 2010
So, I was just thinking the other day, "If only I had X-ray vision for my cell phone camera."
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Your Life Where?
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Jan 09, 2008
Life|ware combines home entertainment and automation using Microsoft’s Media Center as a backbone. All sorts of other companies, such as Lutron, Russound, Niles, SpeakerCraft, HP, Samsung, Honeywell, and etc, make devices that interface with the system so custom installers can tailor a complete automation/entertainment package that puts control of the entire home within a touchpanel or remote control. It’s hard to get the whole concept across sometimes, so the Life|ware people partnered with Disney who supplied the actors pictured here who acted out a corny “life” within a complete Life|ware-equipped home. My personal favorite of the entire setup was the demonstration of a prototype of the Starry Night Sleep Technology bed by a company called Leggett and Platt. The bed monitors your sleep cycle, respiration, heartbeat – it can even tell if you’re snoring – and adjusts the bed accordingly to make your sleepy night perfect. Move over, Big Brother, this is Big Mother. Pricing hasn’t been set yet, but you can bet it’s going to be expensive (with a capital $).
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Your Own HDTV Channel
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Sep 06, 2008
ZvBox’s Zv-100 takes the VGA output of a PC, encodes it on the fly to 720p, and creates a channel that can be sent via coax to any HDTV in your house that has a digital cable (QAM) tuner. Since all it does is convert the output to an HD channel, your computer operates the same way it always does, and you’ll be able to watch or views any content your computer can provide as long as it has the proper codec or program. The beauty of the ZvBox system is that since it is codec agnostic, it can work with iTunes as easily as it works with Windows Media Player – or any other player or website.
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Home Theater Systems ReviewsSoundbar Reviews
ZVOX 425 Speaker System
Darryl Wilkinson  |  Jul 27, 2008
Taking the shortcut home.

Some people would call it cheating. Others might be less pejorative and consider it a shortcut. Either way, setting a rectangular box on top of your TV, plugging in an analog stereo RCA cable, finding an outlet for a single AC power cord, and pressing the power button isn’t what God intended when he gave us home theater. No, a real man’s home theater demands a separate processor and amplifiers, multiple speakers, many long runs of speaker wire, and an inconvenient place to put a subwoofer. It should take real work to set the whole thing up—and more than a sporting chance to wire something incorrectly.

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ZVOX Populi and "No Digital Weirdness"
Darryl Wilkinson  |  May 11, 2007
Okay, we couldn't hear a real demo because the show sample wasn't treated as kindly as it should have been on the trip to New York, but the ZVOX 425 looked nice, anyway. It's a "single-cabinet home theater system" that's five inches deep, mounts on the wall, has a built-in amplifier, five speakers, two powered subwoofers (yeah, that's right, two powered subwoofers in a five-inch deep cabinet that hangs on the wall), and virtual surround circuitry. The subwoofers are side-firing to help eliminate wall vibrations. The box is filled with five 3.25-inch full-range speakers and two 4-inch subwoofers. There's no digital input - it's designed to accept the stereo audio (or headphone jack) output from a TV and use the source material's encoded Dolby Pro Logic signal. As a result, says ZVOX, it's less expensive and there's no "digital weirdness". ZVOX says the 425 is the perfect ticket for people who are painfully afraid of wires and want a simple system they can hang on the wall under their plasma/LCD panel TV and pretend they have true home theater. The total size is 37" W x 7" H x 5" D. Price is $599.99.
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